


I Remembered That Hole in the Wall

by NightCourt_HighLady



Series: A Court of Lyrics and Melodies [6]
Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas, maas
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-28
Updated: 2017-03-28
Packaged: 2018-10-11 23:13:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10476693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NightCourt_HighLady/pseuds/NightCourt_HighLady
Summary: Modern AU. Feyre is on her way back to her friends' house after breaking up with Tamlin. They had grown apart and were no longer right for each other. They had been broken into different shapes that no longer fit. But on her way back, a song forces Feyre to remember not just the bad times, but the good ones too.A fic to remind us that Feyre used to love Tamlin for all that she realized he was wrong for her.There's a little tiny bit of fluffy going-to-be Feysand right there at the end.Songfic for Not Easy by Alex Da Kid





	

**Author's Note:**

> Bet you thought I was gone. Not a chance. I love these things. I'll always go back.
> 
> I've been listening to Not Easy by Alex Da Kid and it reminded me of how hard it was for Feyre to let go of Tamlin even though we all knew that Rhys was better for her.
> 
> Hope you enjoy this fic.

Driving while sobbing is not easy, but I was managing. I had just left Tam’s house after telling him for sure and for certain that I was done. I was never coming back. We didn’t work, I couldn’t be with him anymore after all he’d done. 

But part of me still did love the man he once was.

Who he’d been before.

The smooth guitar riff I’d heard before on the radio, on another day, an easier one, filtered through the speakers of my old, raggedy car. 

When I recognized it, I had to pull over into a neighborhood I didn’t recognize.

_ It's not easy _

_ No, it's not easy _

_ It's not easy breaking your heart _

This was the hardest thing I’d ever done. But we didn’t work anymore. His protective instincts had gone bad. Gone rotten. Gone too far. He protected me so much that he couldn’t let me leave the house. Mor, bright shining Morrigan, had broken me out.

_ It's not easy _

_ No, it's not easy _

_ It's not easy breaking your heart _

Somehow all I could think was of the beginning. Of what he’d been initially. Who he’d been to me and for me.

He’d found me in the middle of poverty, in the middle of darkness, and had brought me out. He was kind to a hard, lonely girl who simply needed someone to love her and, for once, care for her instead of the other way around.

_ We were two dumb kids _

_ Full of grand ideas _

_ We knew this would end from the start _

We were such different people. Such different people. But we saw each other as the answers. We spoke of marriage and kids and careers and the futures you only talk about with someone who you can  _ see _ those things with. And we saw each other that way.

_ From the fire we burned _

_ You and I we learned _

_ It's not easy breaking your heart _

But then, after my kidnapping, he went sour. That instinct to protect, to love, to cherish, had gone dark. He had gone dark. He’d gone somewhere I couldn’t follow. We kept trying to stay, trying to stick it out, and we kept destroying each other. Kept hurting each other.

_ It's not easy _

_ No, it's not easy _

_ It's not easy breaking your heart _

When he saw me, when he found me after my disappearance, he looked shattered. Broken. Almost as broken as he looked today. He had hoped to leave his past behind him. Behind us. But it caught up to us instead.

_ It's not easy _

_ No, it's not easy _

_ It's not easy breaking your heart _

He took me on endless walks in the shining woods. We found pools and rivers and little glades. The first time he kissed me, we sat next to a pool so silvery it looked like liquid starlight. I could still see it. I remember the feeling of his lips on my skin, the joy I felt in being loved and cherished.

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

I remember the first time I saw him get angry. His best friend Lucian took the brunt of it. I ran and hid, and Lucian tried to talk him down. Later, I apologized to Lucian. He just smiled sadly and said it was how Tamlin was, and that leaving was the best thing I could have done.

_ We were two dumb kids _

_ Full of hopes and fears _

_ Growing further and further apart _

When I awoke in tears, throwing up from fear and panic and claustrophobia, he never came. Every night I hoped for him, then just anyone, to notice and help me. 

No one did.

He was obsessed with my bodily safety to the point that he ignored the changes in my mind and my personality. He was ignoring the person I’d been broken into.

_ So you shook your head _

_ Looked at me and said _

_ "It's not easy breaking your heart." _

I had done it. I’d left. He’d never trouble me again hopefully. 

But it was awful. I felt a piece of myself shatter and be destroyed as I walked out of that suffocating house for the last time. The last piece of what could have been me and him together. The last remnants of that girl.

_ It's not easy _

_ It's not easy _

_ No, it's not easy _

_ It's not easy _

_ It's not easy breaking your heart _

I was overjoyed when he asked me to marry him. But at the end, it was the last gasp to save a dying relationship. It made nothing better. Nothing changed.

We had both changed. In ways that made us incompatible.

_ It's not easy _

_ Not easy _

_ No, it's not easy _

_ It's not easy breaking your heart _

Part of me couldn’t bear to leave him. Part of me never wanted to hurt him. The part of me that remembered the man who had given me the one thing I’d always thought I wanted: space and time to paint and paint to my heart’s content.

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

It wasn’t his fault that I couldn’t paint anymore. But expecting me to do so when I was so shattered was too much.

_ We started small and conquered it all _

_ Came from nothing, but knew we would ball _

_ Some looked at us and said we would fall _

_ We tryna to do it big like no one done it before _

We were fighting the odds. When people finally began to believe in us was when things started falling apart. All we wanted was to be together at first. But when it worked out for us we realized that it wasn’t going to work after all. 

_ I remembered that hole in the wall _

_ Twelve of us in the bus, we was all going hard _

_ Waiting for hard work to pay off _

_ They'll come and take your spot if you take a day off _

Fear is a horrible thing. Fear took over when the light left his eyes and he no longer recognized me as me. Fear was all I felt at first. It hid my instincts, but it couldn’t hide the starburst of pain on my forehead after I tried to talk to him about things. Or the matching one across my mouth after. Or the hole he made in the wall after he recognized me. After he saw the blooming black eye and the split in my lip.

It lived under my skin for the month afterwards, making me wonder when the monster inside him was coming back out.

_ It's not easy _

_ No _

_ No, it's not easy _

_ No, it's not easy _

_ It's not easy breaking your heart _

_ (I don't really wanna break your heart) _

I cried as I remembered the good times. The painting. The gifts. The love. The surprises. The joy.

_ It's not easy _

_ No, it's not easy _

_ It's not easy breaking your heart _

_ (I don't really wanna break your heart) _

I cried even more as I remembered the bad times. The times when I was so  _ glad _ for my expensive makeup. The times when he wouldn’t speak to me. The times when he left me in that house.

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ (Yeah, it's Young Khalifa man) _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ (I don't really wanna break your heart) _

_ (Gotta do what I gotta do) _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ (To get where I'm going) _

By now it was an ugly cry. I was sobbing and there was snot everywhere. I hiccupped through my tears, slipping past crying and into a panic attack. My face was pressed into my hands, my knees tucked up close to my thin chest.

One last piece of me had broken off.

_ (I don't really wanna break your heart) _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ (Haha, ain't nothin' gon' stop that) _

_ (We just gon' keep going and going) _

_ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh _

_ (I don't really wanna break your heart) _

_ (I don't really wanna break your heart) _

Sometime during the middle of the song, a smooth black car had pulled up behind me, engine so quiet I couldn’t hear it’s purr over the music. I wouldn’t have realized it if I hadn’t heard my door open. Looking up, I saw a pair of heartbroken violet eyes. He held his arms out, offering. I didn’t even hesitate before throwing myself out of the car and sobbing brokenly on his shoulder. 

He pulled me over to his car. Mor got out of the passenger seat and instead of walking toward me, she got in my car and drove it off. Rhys picked me up, arms cradling me close to him as I ruined his black silk shirt with tears and snot. 

We sat down in the driver’s seat and he stroked my hair, murmuring to me. 

After a time, I stopped sobbing. I looked up at him.

“Thank you,” I rasped.

“My shoulder is yours whenever you need it,” he said softly.

“Sorry about your shirt.”

“I have too many of these things,” Rhys replied. “Mor will look at it as another opportunity to buy me something in a shade of color.” A look of distaste washed over his features. It was so surprising that I barked out a small laugh.

“Blue,” I scratched out. He raised an eyebrow, handed me a bottle of water, then waited for me to repeat myself. I obliged. “I think you should wear blue sometime. Not sky blue, dark blue.” 

“For you, Feyre darling, I will wear anything.”

“Anything?” I inquired with a ghost of my former humor.

“Anything,” he promised.

I knew then I’d heal. It would take time, but with my friends by my side I could weather any storm. Especially this one.


End file.
